Bash-N-The Code -- Big Mouth (1987)

 

It was a time when pop music was fun, happy and carefree. It made even the most stauch wallflowers (such as myself) want to get up and tap his toes when nobody else was looking. It put a smile on our faces and we could just feel the energy flow in and out of our body, give us a jolt of adrenaline, and let it permeate the atmosphere. In concert, it literally permeated the atmosphere and we could literally feel it seep into our bones. For us youth-groupers at the time, the joy that came from 80s pop music was boosted all the more through the Spirit of Christian joy.

One of the bands that really exemplified this spirit of Christian joy and carefree fun was Bash-N-The Code, and their second album, Big Mouth, was the best of their unfortunately short-lived career.

The album opens with an 80s rollicking dance-style version of the children’s Sunday School song, “The B-I-B-L-E,” which made anyone–no matter your age–want to get up and get into it. From there, we go straight into the rocking praise song, “You Are The One,” and onto another praise song, the quirky (in a good way), “Righteous Dance.”

But the album isn’t all upbeat party music. Song four’s “Use This Child,” is a Cyndi Lauper -style power-pop ballad that has ‘hit song’ written all over it, though, as I recall, it was not as big of a hit as it should have been. Side 1 closes with the rockabilly-meets-Footloose -style album title, “Big Mouth.” Fair Warning–if listened to, your brain will sing this song for days, no matter how hard you try (not that you should) to get it out of your head.

Side 2 begins with a nice mid-tempo, radio-friendly remake of the Andrea Crouch classic, (which most of us Gen Xers first heard here), “Soon and Very Soon,” featuring the great Randy Stonehill on vocals. Next is another radio hit, “He Says,” where lead singer Jamie Kearney really channelled her inner Cyndi Lauper (maybe a little too much).

The following song, another one that goes more toward the rock charts, is “Fall Down,” featuring Mark Townsend on lead vocals, and then goes straight into the chorus, “We Magnify You Lord (I Will Call Upon The Lord),” which was normally sung quite joyfully in churches but is here sung quietly–the opposite of what one would expect from this crew. Big Mouth ends with a special extended remix of “You Are The One,” also (if I’m not mistaken) sung by Townsend, and is a nice rockin’ reprise to end this album.

Overall, this short-lived group made a big-mouthed, big-impact on Christian youth during the late 80s with inspirational lyrics and music to make us smile–and you can sense they made God smile too.